As disclosed in Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 2008-213714, some of the vehicles are installed with an emergency call device which performs an emergency call to a service center on the outside of the vehicles at the time of vehicle collision. Further, Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 2009-234379 discloses installing a vehicle-mounted device at a position between left and right seats where deformation is relatively less likely to occur at the time of vehicle collision.
It is desirable that the emergency call device is operated at the time of collision in any direction. In view of the above, as disclosed in the above Publication No. 2009-234379, there is proposed installing an emergency call device in a center console disposed between left and right seats. However, it may be difficult or impossible to secure a sufficient space in the center console for installing an emergency call device, taking into consideration that an air conditioning unit for rear seats and other vehicle-mounted devices are installed in the center console.
Meanwhile, it is often the case that attachment devices such as a portable telephone antenna, a GPS antenna, a microphone, and a speaker for an emergency call device are respectively installed on the rear side of a dashboard panel separating an engine room and a vehicle chamber (e.g. in an instrument panel). In view of the above, there is proposed installing an emergency call device on the rear side of a dashboard panel, taking into consideration that it is easy to connect the emergency call device to the attachment devices such as a portable telephone antenna. In this case, however, it is desirable to effectively protect the emergency call device at the time of frontal collision of a vehicle, taking into consideration that the dashboard panel may be deformed rearward at the time of frontal collision of the vehicle.